Usable Example 1
Kiegan Rice
March 23, 2017
We are interested in exploring the history of African Americans in the United States using the available census data. To do this, I have used the ‘Get Your Data’ Shiny tool to find three different .csv files relating to the population of African Americans in U.S. states. There are three different files because the census uses different words to refer to African Americans at different points in history. Because of these changes, one file contains variable names that use the term ‘slave’, one file contains variable names that use the term ‘colored’, and the third contains variable names that use the term ‘negro’. These files are in the ‘inst’ folder in statatlas.
1790
1800
1810
1820
1830
1840
1850
Since we are in 1850 now, and many states have abolished slavery at this point, it may be interesting to look at just total population. Even though we can look at comparing the number of slaves in all the states and the number of free persons in all the states, we haven’t looked at just a total count of how many African Americans live in various states.
1860
## Year State TOTAL.POPULATION SLAVES
## Min. :1860 Length:8737 Min. : 6857 Min. : NA
## 1st Qu.:1860 Class :character 1st Qu.: 604215 1st Qu.: NA
## Median :1860 Mode :character Median : 708002 Median : NA
## Mean :1860 Mean : 923076 Mean :NaN
## 3rd Qu.:1860 3rd Qu.:1109801 3rd Qu.: NA
## Max. :1860 Max. :3880735 Max. : NA
## NA's :8737
## Type FEMALE.SLAVES MALES.SLAVES TOTAL.SLAVES
## Length:8737 Min. : NA Min. : NA Min. : NA
## Class :character 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: NA
## Mode :character Median : NA Median : NA Median : NA
## Mean :NaN Mean :NaN Mean :NaN
## 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: NA
## Max. : NA Max. : NA Max. : NA
## NA's :8737 NA's :8737 NA's :8737
## TOTAL.FEMALE.SLAVES TOTAL.MALE.SLAVES AGGR..SLAVES FREE.COLORED.MALES
## Min. : 2 Min. : 0 Min. : 2 Min. : NA
## 1st Qu.: 42876 1st Qu.: 44313 1st Qu.: 87189 1st Qu.: NA
## Median :139349 Median :136370 Median :275719 Median : NA
## Mean :122953 Mean :125597 Mean :248550 Mean :NaN
## 3rd Qu.:164590 3rd Qu.:171977 3rd Qu.:331726 3rd Qu.: NA
## Max. :241382 Max. :249483 Max. :490865 Max. : NA
## NA's :3021 NA's :3021 NA's :3021 NA's :8737
## FREE.COLORED.FEMALES TOTAL.FREE.COLORED.PERSONS
## Min. : NA Min. : NA
## 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: NA
## Median : NA Median : NA
## Mean :NaN Mean :NaN
## 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: NA
## Max. : NA Max. : NA
## NA's :8737 NA's :8737
## TOTAL.FREE.COLORED.FEMALES TOTAL.FREE.COLORED.MALES
## Min. : 10 Min. : 35
## 1st Qu.: 478 1st Qu.: 454
## Median : 3232 Median : 3567
## Mean : 8256 Mean : 7529
## 3rd Qu.:10368 3rd Qu.: 8279
## Max. :44196 Max. :39746
##
## TOTAL.FREE.COLORED.POPULATION WHITE.AND.FREE.COLORED.FAMILIES
## Min. : NA Min. : NA
## 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: NA
## Median : NA Median : NA
## Mean :NaN Mean :NaN
## 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: NA
## Max. : NA Max. : NA
## NA's :8737 NA's :8737
## COLORED.PERSONS COLORED.MALES COLORED.FEMALES TOTAL.COLORED.FEMALES
## Min. : NA Min. : NA Min. : NA Min. : NA
## 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: NA
## Median : NA Median : NA Median : NA Median : NA
## Mean :NaN Mean :NaN Mean :NaN Mean :NaN
## 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: NA
## Max. : NA Max. : NA Max. : NA Max. : NA
## NA's :8737 NA's :8737 NA's :8737 NA's :8737
## TOTAL.COLORED.MALES NEGRO.POPULATION..1870 NEGRO.POPULATION..1880
## Min. : NA Min. : NA Min. : NA
## 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: NA
## Median : NA Median : NA Median : NA
## Mean :NaN Mean :NaN Mean :NaN
## 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: NA
## Max. : NA Max. : NA Max. : NA
## NA's :8737 NA's :8737 NA's :8737
## NEGRO.FEMALES NEGRO.MALES TOTAL.NEGROES FEMALE.NEGROES
## Min. : NA Min. : NA Min. : NA Min. : NA
## 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: NA
## Median : NA Median : NA Median : NA Median : NA
## Mean :NaN Mean :NaN Mean :NaN Mean :NaN
## 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: NA
## Max. : NA Max. : NA Max. : NA Max. : NA
## NA's :8737 NA's :8737 NA's :8737 NA's :8737
## MALE.NEGROES NEGROES long lat
## Min. : NA Min. : NA Min. :-124.57 Min. :24.55
## 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: NA 1st Qu.: -89.51 1st Qu.:30.04
## Median : NA Median : NA Median : -84.67 Median :36.50
## Mean :NaN Mean :NaN Mean : -85.64 Mean :35.97
## 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: NA 3rd Qu.: -79.09 3rd Qu.:40.98
## Max. : NA Max. : NA Max. : -66.95 Max. :49.38
## NA's :8737 NA's :8737 NA's :3 NA's :3
## order hole piece id
## Min. : 1 Mode :logical 1 :5450 Length:8737
## 1st Qu.: 2193 FALSE:8734 2 : 337 Class :character
## Median : 4682 NA's :3 3 : 120 Mode :character
## Mean : 4802 6 : 102
## 3rd Qu.: 7379 4 : 93
## Max. :10399 (Other):2632
## NA's :3 NA's : 3
## group
## Florida.1 : 315
## Texas.1 : 312
## Virginia.1 : 297
## North Carolina.1: 283
## Georgia.1 : 250
## (Other) :7277
## NA's : 3
Again, since we are getting to the point where many states are completely free states, it may be interesting to look at just total numbers of African Americans. Being able to see how the African American population shifts around in states as slavery becomes abolished in certain areas - and soon after, in all states - tells us an interesting story as well.
